


Ten of Cups

by sallyamongpoison



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types
Genre: M/M, Post-Trespasser, excessive sweetness, wedding fic, written for prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-16
Updated: 2016-06-16
Packaged: 2018-07-15 12:24:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 792
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7222234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sallyamongpoison/pseuds/sallyamongpoison
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Dorian reflects on his life ahead during his wedding celebration.</p><p>Written as a prompt response to the tarot card: Ten of Cups</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ten of Cups

_You have seen me when no other would recognize my face. You composed the cadence of my heart. ~ Chant of Light, Canticle of Trials 1:10_

Cups clinked, laughter echoed all around them, the smell of food filled the house in a way it hadn’t in a long time. There was family everywhere. There was love everywhere. No matter where you looked there were smiles and warmth and happiness, and that was something that was so overpowering it was almost painful. Hearts overflowed. That love spread from person to person like they were all connected by a piece of string. It was a web of love, a web of life, and all were connected together as they ate and drank and spent that time together.

This was it. This was the happy ending. This was where the book ended and the speculation of what ‘happily ever after’ meant. In the books it seemed like no hardship or strife would ever occur, but where was the fun in that? Out of all this, out of everything that had happened, the truth remained that there was healing in conflict and resolution. A life without compromise, without struggle, would have been far too easy.

Dorian didn’t do easy.

What Dorian _did_ do, however, was look over at his husband and where he laughed at the head of the table with a nephew on his lap and his younger sister at his left. He was so happy. Cullen was so happy. They’d spent their time, since they’d met and grown together, learning and fighting and compromising. That happily ever after would continue in that same fashion. Dorian never wanted to know Cullen completely set in his ways and not willing to push. They’d pushed, pushed hard, and now they sat at their table after their wedding surrounded by so many people and so much love.

They’d lived through the withdrawals. They’d lived through the doubt. They’d lived through the death. They’d made it work from across continents and work and a few attempted political assassinations. They’d made it through physical changes, logistical changes, and they’d come out of it more in love than they’d been even when they decided to try to make this work. He’d seen Cullen wear many hats, many uniforms, and still he always recognized the man he loved so dearly. Dorian would never not know him. It didn’t matter if the man was a Templar, a Commander, an Advisor to the Divine, or the man running a rehabilitation compound in the wild hills of Ferelden. He was _Cullen_.

And now Dorian was Magister Pavus.

Well, no. He was Magister Dorian Pavus- _Rutherford_ , and he couldn’t wait to be announced when he returned to Tevinter. The looks alone would have been worth the price of admission, and with it came the support of a family that had grown to love him over the years. With Halward gone and Aquinea estranged as she was, Cullen’s sisters and brother had taken him into their fold and loved him like he’d never known a family could love. Seeing them, seeing how they loved their brother so, it all made sense how Cullen could have such a big heart. They all did, and they’d all stood beside him when he needed that support.

He caught Cullen’s gaze, one that was a mixture of awe and excitement and love, and he smiled for it. They’d been celebrating for hours with family and friends, and Dorian couldn’t have imagined how things could have been better. Maybe…maybe if Felix had been able to see it, but Cullen had murmured in his ear the night before that there was no question that his best and oldest friend was looking down on them. It had shined a light on their union, those words, and for a moment Dorian had wondered if those words from the Chant, the ones that they’d asked to have in their vows, were true.

Somehow, in the wake of defeating a would-be God and the realization that Fen’Harel meant to unmake the world and leaving the Inquisition to the Divine under Lavellan’s watch, Cullen had been the one to make his heart beat with more purpose than he’d had before. It was more than spite, more than duty, and now more than just himself. It was them both. Their hearts beat for each other and for the people they loved.

Dorian had it all now. He had love, he had a family, and he had the knowledge that both he and Cullen were doing what they could to make the world a better place. Separately, together, a mix of the two…it didn’t matter. He had everything he needed or wanted.

He had his happily ever after.

**Author's Note:**

> come find me on tumblr! @sallyamongpoison


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